Instant Karma (Episode 01 - Alternate Season 9)
by Bohemia86
Summary: As Sam and Dean deal with the immediate after-effects of the Trials, it soon becomes clear that all is not as it seems. Faced with the reemergence of old friends, how will Team Free Will cope when it discovers that what they knew of Angels and Demons was only the tip of the iceberg? SPOILERS TO THE END OF SEASON 8


_Hello there. I'm going to be writing an alternate season 9, posting a new 'episode' each Wednesday until the end of October. I'd love to know what you think. Thanks for reading :)_

* * *

Dean Winchester had seen a lot of things in his thirty-four years on Earth. Not to mention everything during _Righteous Man: The Hell Years. _The kind of things that would send most people running for the hills, or, at the very least, provide them with enough material to warrant a few years of really intense therapy. So ultimately, it took something special to actually shock him.

Angels falling from the sky in a twisted parody of an aerial display team didn't actually rate that highly on the Winchester 'Something Special' scale, particularly when Dean was far more concerned about his brother's rapidly deteriorating state of health.

He couldn't, however, fail to flinch when the sound of multiple bodies hitting the ground in the vicinity of the church reached his ears. Each dull thud caused an involuntary clench of his gut, and it was only decades of suppressing rising bile in the face of stench and decay that allowed him to breathe through the nausea.

Dean shook his head as Sam gave a particularly violent wheeze next to him. "Come on Sammy." He gripped his brother's arm tightly with his left hand, his right alternating between clutching Sam's shirt and uselessly patting the younger Winchester's shoulder. "Come on, little brother."

Sam's eyes were alight with horror as he looked up at Dean. He was only peripherally aware of the gravel sharply digging into his legs, too focused as he was on the metal of the Impala blessedly cooling his burning skin through his shirt.

"Cas!" Dean yelled again, his shouts already tinged with hoarseness. "Cas! Where the hell are you?" He looked around wildly, trying to ignore the increasingly incessant voice telling him it was pointless, that Cas wasn't coming. That Cas might even be-

"D-Dean."

Sam's gasp had Dean whipping his head back quickly enough to cause whiplash. "Just breathe, Sammy." Dean was certain he wasn't doing a particularly stellar job of keeping the panic out of his tone.

"Take me back," Sam heaved out eventually. "Back inside."

"What?" Dean's panic was momentarily derailed by complete surprise. "I'm not taking you back in there."

"Please, Dean."

And dammit if Dean was ever again going to deny Sam begging anything of him this wasn't that moment.

"This better not be a suicide mission, Sammy," the words wrung painfully from Dean's soul despite his default need to lighten the dire situation. "There's been enough of those already."

"No," Sam wheezed, grappling with Dean's jacket, trying to find a tight enough hold as his older brother bodily dragged him back into the church.

"Get me out of here!" Crowley's voice rang through the darkness, an unexpected twang colouring the edge of his usual accent.

"Can it, Crowley," Dean growled as the King of Hell noisily rattled the chains binding him to the chair as he twisted in a pitiful attempt to escape. A sudden flare of light through the broken window illuminated the room for a split-second and Dean was sure that Crowley looked genuinely shaken.

"Handcuffs," Sam hissed, balling a fist against his chest as he was rocked by another spasm. "Get the handcuffs."

Dean's eyes widened. "We're not letting him go."

Sam shook his head fighting for breath. Black tendrils were already snaking into the edges of his vision as his body rebelled against his attempts at gulping in air. "Put the handcuffs on me."

"Sa-"

"Dean!" Sam's eyes bugged as he felt his throat constrict on the end of his shout. His fingernails clawed desperately at his throat as he prayed for his brother to listen to him.

Any indecision still plaguing Dean was obliterated when Sam's knees buckled almost sending them both crashing to the ground.

Dean lowered his brother to the floorboards as quickly and as carefully as he could before thrusting his hand into his jacket pocket to retrieve the key to the cuffs.

"Yes," Crowley nodded vigorously," good! Take the cuffs off."

"Shut the fuck up," Dean hissed as he heard the left cuff snap open. He stepped behind the chair and placed his hands on the backrest. With a violent shove the chair crashed to the ground, Crowley's pained grunt audible over the noise of wood splintering on impact.

Ensuring Crowley remained within the Devil's Trap, Dean carefully tugged his brother close enough to secure the cool metal around Sam's wrist with a resounding click.

Dean barely had time to register the unholy shriek that split the air around them before his vision whited out and he slipped into oblivion with only a whispered gasp of surprise.

* * *

Castiel couldn't look away from the sight of his brothers and sisters falling to Earth, wings burning from them with a final flash of Grace. The light produced would have been beautiful if the cause of the luminescence had not been so horrifying.

He was dimly aware that the lancing pain in his chest was a physical manifestation of grief. He'd experienced a sense of loss before, but without his Grace to dull the sensations the feeling he'd experienced as an angel was intensified, cutting sharply through the fallible humanity he now possessed.

No, not _possessed_; consisted of.

He also knew that something had gone horribly wrong with his Fall. He was, of course, by now aware of the fact that normal rules of survival and existence rarely applied to him, but _this _was something he could not have expected, that _nobody_ could have foreseen.

When Anna had fallen her connection with Heaven had been instantly severed, taking with it all memories of her true form and her position within The Host when she was reborn on Earth as a human. That was how it was supposed to be; a fallen angel did not require, or _deserve_, a connection to the devoted servants of God.

Admittedly Anna had regained a sliver of connection to Heaven as she grew into a young woman, but this, _this _was different.

Why was he still wearing the former body of Jimmy Novak? His essence should have scattered into the universe on impact, a transient entity waiting for rebirth.

Why did he remember everything? Why was he still able to recall the image of Naomi, eyes open in an unfocused gaze, slumped over her desk? Why did Metatron's words about a new life still ring in his ears?

And _why_ was he keenly aware that the Winchesters were probably placing themselves in mortal danger (again)?

He didn't have a satisfactory answer to any of these questions, but as he tore his eyes away from the macabre lightshow he voiced an entirely different question to the eerily still woods surrounding him.

"Where am I?"

* * *

Dean wasn't sure if it was the loud voice or the unrelenting tapping against his cheek that dragged his unwilling mind back to awareness. As pleased as he was at the thought of telling whatever it was disturbing him to piss off, his whole body still protested when he cracked open one eyelid.

"Dean!"

Sam's relieved, and obnoxiously loud, cry caused Dean to clamp his eye shut once more, clinging to the darkness behind his lids as if it might take the pain away. He couldn't cope with Sam's booming voice nearby when he-

Wait…

Dean's eyes flew open and he scrambled into a crouch while every muscle he possessed whined in horror at the sudden abuse. "Sammy!"

Sam, looking decidedly wrung-out, but no longer as if he was about to take a one-way ticket upstairs, was slouched against the upturned chair; the handcuff still tightly encasing his wrist and binding him to Crowley.

"What the hell happened?" Dean asked, not resisting the urge to scramble over an unconscious Crowley to grasp his brother's arm.

Sam sighed. "I don't really know. There was a light, and by the time it faded you'd already passed out."

Dean fought the compulsion to balk at the term 'passed out', instead asking, "How did you know to put the handcuffs on?"

"I didn't," Sam shook his head, running his free hand through his sweat-matted hair. "I just felt like I _needed_ to get back inside; it was like there was a voice in my head telling me what to do."

"A voice?" Dean's right eyebrow rose in an arch that suggested a combination of scepticism and downright horror.

"Not _that_ voice," Sam replied with a barely repressed shudder. "But the second the mechanism snapped closed, I felt…" he trailed off with a shrug. "Better, I guess?"

"Better?" And there went the left eyebrow.

Sam nodded. "I know it sounds crazy. Believe me, I _know_."

Dean ran a hand over his face. It took him a long moment to realise that the world around them was completely silent; not a single wisp of breeze stirred the air, and only a weak glimmer of moonlight broke through the darkness.

Sam, noticing the way Dean's jaw tightened, leaned over slightly to tap his brother on the arm. "They stopped falling a few minutes after the light went out. Jesus, Dean, was that _all_ the angels?"

Dean's hand tightened into a fist as he let it drop to his knee. "I think it was."

Sam pursed his lips for a second. "And Cas?" he asked carefully.

Dean's eyes shut for a fraction longer than a normal blink and Sam knew he had his answer, _and_ that he needed to tread carefully. His older brother might have been beyond pissed with the angel (former angel?) for not trusting him, but Sam knew with certainty that Dean wouldn't do well with the knowledge that Cas was gone permanently this time. After Rafael, Lucifer, Leviathan, _purgatory, _and whatever the hell had happened in the crypt, Dean had dealt with each loss of Cas with an increasing degree of recklessness and brooding. Sam almost growled in frustration; how many more times were they going to lose someone they cared about?

Dean looked ready to say something, but instead paused with a frown. Without explanation he reached into his jacket and extracted his phone. He pointedly kept his eyes on the screen as he pressed a few buttons and raised the phone to his ear.

_You have reached the voicemail of *beep* I don't understand…why, why do you want me to say my name? *beep* *beep* *beep* *beep**beep* *beep* *beeeeeep*_

Dean held the phone tightly to his ear, releasing a rush of breath through his lips. "Cas…" he trailed off and ignored the pitying look Sam was shooting at him. He cleared his throat and tried again, "Cas, if you get this…get your feathery ass to the bunker…okay?" Dean allowed himself one fanciful second to wait for a reply before ending the call.

"Dean…"

Dean gave in and looked at his brother. He tensed his shoulders in automatic response to the compassion on his brother's overly expressive face.

"We need to get back to the Batcave," Dean climbed to his feet, dusting off his jeans as he did so.

"Dean, y-"

"If there's angels falling all over the place then someone's gonna have noticed," Dean ploughed on, ignoring his brother. "When Anna fell she had to be reborn as a human, but I don't know what happens to all the vessels." He looked consideringly at Crowley trying to think of any plan that wouldn't involve putting the King of Hell back in his beloved car.

"Dean, I think we need to ju-"

"I'll call Kevin," Dean cut Sam off once more. "See if he can work out why the cuffs are working on you, and better yet see if he can find Garth."

Dean turned away from Sam; the younger Winchester's face caught somewhere between a familiar bitchface expression and one that suggested he thought Dean might lash out at any moment. He glanced down at his phone, the screen dark and not responding to his silent pleas for it to ring.

* * *

They were twenty miles outside of Lebanon when Dean's ringtone blared loudly enough to wake the dead. Dean was so surprised the Impala swerved dangerously across the blessedly deserted road.

He refused to look at the screen and passed the phone back to Sam, who was leaning far away from a slouched, still unconscious Crowley on the backseat.

"Who is it?" Dean asked, his eyes darting quickly between the road and his brother's reflection.

"It's Garth," Sam replied, before raising the phone to his ear. "Garth, where the hell have you been?"

Dean gestured vaguely. Sam, interpreting that to mean _put the damn thing on speakerphone_, tapped at the phone after a brief moment of fumbling due to the cuffs and Garth's voice filtered into the car.

"-they landed."

"Say that again, Garth," Sam replied. "We didn't catch the beginning of it."

"I said the network's lighting up like a Christmas tree; hundreds of reports of falling objects, and nothing but a scorch mark where they were seen to land," Garth repeated. "I'm gonna come meet you two in Kansas."

"How does he know we're in Kansas?" Dean asked, turning to look back at Sam quickly. He raised his voice to shout towards the phone, the car swerving slightly again, "How do you know we're in Kansas?"

"I _told_ you," Garth sighed. It's-"

Garth's response was cut off by static crackling through the earpiece, loud enough that even Crowley stirred.

"What?" Sam asked as the odd syllable from Garth popped through the white noise.

"-ith me. He checks out. Definitely not a demon." Garth continued regardless. "He might be able to explain better."

"What was that?" Sam asked again. "Who checks out?"

Muffled shuffling filtered through the air.

"Garth?" Sam called into the phone. "Garth!"

The shuffling sound stopped a second before a different voice responded.

"Hello, Sam."

Dean involuntarily slammed his foot on the brake, the car fishtailing across the road for the second time in as many days.

Sam breathed in sharply as the Impala screeched to a stop. "Cas?"

* * *

_Lebanon, Kansas_

Dean slammed the tumbler down on the map table, his ire increasing when he couldn't hear the satisfying _clunk_ over the frantic blares of the alarm system echoing through the bunker. He clenched his fists, blood pounding in his ears as he fought to ignore the urge to punch something.

The brief, and completely uninformative, 'conversation' between Sam and Cas had set Dean on edge, not to mention the slight sounds of protest the Impala had made as he'd gunned the engine when they were within five miles of the bunker. So arriving back to the Batcave to find Kevin cowering from the alarm noises (and, _Jesus_, the kid was afraid of his own shadow again) had _not_ improved Dean's mood.

He'd tried turning off the power, but a generator kicked in somewhere and after only a short-lived lull the whining began again, seemingly with even more gusto than before.

Method two had found him trying to locate the generator, but even after consulting the blueprints for the structure he still had no idea where it was hidden.

Method number three, which was the final attempt before he'd turned to the hunter's helper, had been to shout obscenities at the alarm system and fire a bullet into a screen displaying a warning light in order to intimidate it into silence.

Needless to say that had failed miserably.

"Kevin!" Dean yelled, stomping from the room. "Kevin, I thought you were supposed to be a genius!"

Kevin, to his credit, was wedged under the main controls attempting method number four - trying to disable the alarms with nothing but a screwdriver and some AP physics knowledge. Dean watched him for a few seconds, but when it was clear that Kevin wasn't going to respond (either because he was suffering temporary deafness, or was just ignoring Dean) he ran a hand over his face and headed down the corridor to 7B. Behind the closed door of his destination the alarms were blessedly muffled.

If Dean was honest, the dungeon had seemed like a much cooler space to own when it didn't have his brother locked inside it; now it just seemed kind of creepy. Sam had insisted he remain secured to Crowley when they'd arrived back in Lebanon, and had managed to convince Dean quite easily that the best thing for him to do would be to stay in the dungeon until Garth and Cas arrived. In Dean's defence he probably wouldn't have agreed so readily to incarcerate his little brother if he'd been functioning on all cylinders, but suffice to say the riotous alarm and the knowledge that Cas was alive had been enough to sideswipe his concentration.

Dean pulled on the bookshelves until he felt the concealed doors lock into place and begin to open. Aiming his flashlight through the widening crack he could make out Sam sitting against the far wall; the cuffs connected his left wrist to Crowley's right, with the chain twisted at a slightly awkward angle between them on the floor. Dean had insisted on securing Crowley's other hand to a manacle on the wall above his head, and Sam had mirrored the action with his own right hand. Crowley had regained an element of lucidity as they'd parked the car, but, thanks to a well-aimed fist to the face courtesy of a particularly volatile Dean Winchester, he was unconscious once more. Dean had claimed the strength of the punch was only enough to knock Crowley out, and thus avoid him learning of the location of his new 'home'. Sam had secretly thought the strength of the punch had been proportional to the amount of satisfaction his older brother received from socking the King of Hell on the nose.

Sam blinked up at his brother, his brow creasing into a frown as Dean passed the flashlight beam too close to his eyes.

"Nothing from Chuckles, yet?" Dean nodded towards Crowley as he leaned against the wall, averting his eyes from the shackles keeping his brother in place; it was all a little too close to when he'd locked Sam in Bobby's panic room, afraid that he was losing his brother to the dark side for good.

"No," Sam replied, tugging slightly on the handcuff in order to jostle Crowley. "He hasn't moved since you left. How hard did you actually hit him, Dean?"

"Not hard enough," Dean spat. "Look, I don't like the idea of you being down here with him, even if he can't do anything. I'll get Garth to help me look through everything we have as soon as he arrives, Kevin too. The Men of Letters have got to have something about this somewhere."

"Cas might know what's going on," Sam suggested, completely clued into the fact that the angel's name had been omitted from Dean's research task force.

Dean gave a humourless laugh. "Yeah, sure."

"Dean," Sam shook his head, "seriously, you really need to lay off him, at least until we know what's going on. I thought you'd be happy."

"Happy, Sam?" Dean scrunched up his face in distaste. "You thought I'd be happy that because of him, God's whackjob PA managed to close up Heaven and leave all the angels on our side? You thought I'd be happy that thousands of those feathery douchebags fell out of the sky and disappeared, I mean _disappeared,_ Sammy. We didn't see hide nor hair of a single one of them from South Dakota to Kansas, and then Cas just so happens to find Garth?"

Sam wished both of his hands were free so he could shake some sense into his pigheaded brother. "Jesus, Dean, what exactly do you _want_ here? You're pissed off with Cas when he doesn't help, you're pissed off when he _does_ help, and now, despite the fact that you _called _him, you're pissed off that he isn't _dead_."

Dean scowled. "Yeah, well excuse me for thinking it's all a little bit convenient that he somehow managed to escape the gallows again."

Sam gave a snort of derision.

"What?" Dean snapped.

Sam shook his head again and it was a very different kind of pity he graced Dean with this time. "Nothing."

Dean stared at his brother for a long moment, but he was met with a prolonged stony silence. "Alright. Are you going to be okay down here?"

"Just go sort out that alarm," Sam slouched back against the wall, avoiding his brother's eyes. "It's pissing me off."

Dean pursed his lips, ready to say something. But instinct got the better of him and he turned away with a quiet. "Holler if you need me." He pulled the bookcase closed behind him and went to find Kevin, the proverbial tail well and truly between his legs

* * *

_Storm Lake, Iowa_

Mickey Tandy was proud to say that he'd lived and worked within the same five-mile stretch of road since the day he was born. He didn't need to see the rest of the world, not when he had everything he'd ever wanted right here on his doorstep. The simple life suited him well enough, and he'd gone almost seventy years without any surprises landing on his doorstep.

So it was with a true sense of trepidation that Mickey approached the surprise that had quite literally _landed_ on his doorstep.

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph," Mickey whispered, one hand clutching his shotgun, the other crossing himself with a quick prayer to the God above. He'd been ripped from sleep thinking the house was falling down around him, but even after the terrible crash faded, the four walls of his lifelong home were standing strong.

As he pushed open the screen door he suddenly wished he'd taken Ernie's advice and got himself a guard dog. A big Alsatian would have been appreciated when he saw the man on his front lawn jerkily rising to his feet.

"Who the hell are you?" Mickey called, making a valiant effort to keep his voice steady in the face of the tall man in front of him.

The man remained silent, staring down at his hands in confusion. He raised his arms to his face and prodded the skin as though he'd never encountered it before.

"I _said,_" Mickey bravely stepped forward and raised the gun, "who the hell are you? What are you doing on my land?"

"I don't…" The man finally looked up at Mickey when he spoke, flicking light hair out of his eyes. "I don't know."

Mickey narrowed his eyes. "You can't take an old man like me in, son. I've seen it all." This man didn't have to know Mickey had never left Storm Lake, after all. "Now tell me who you are, or just get the hell of my property."

"I don't know," the man repeated. "I was-" He cut himself off with a violent gasp, clutching his head.

"What's wrong with you?" Mickey's frown deepened. "Don't try and play me, boy, I'm not falling for any of your tricks."

The man didn't answer; he simply dropped to his knees, still clutching at his skull while his mouth opened in a silent scream.

Mickey hesitated. It didn't look like this guy was faking it, and well, Mickey wasn't the type to stand by when a poor soul was in trouble – even if he considered said poor soul to be mightily strange - he was wearing some kind of robe, after all.

"I'm calling nine-one-one," Mickey informed the gasping man on the lawn. "Try not to die on my azaleas. And you'd better have insurance."

* * *

_Lebanon, Kansas_

"So then I told Jen that I couldn't see her any more," Garth explained, his eyes never leaving the road as he turned off towards the bunker's location. "Not when she wouldn't believe me about the Siren. I mean I _know _she was an evil bitch who was trying to kill me, but I'm a man, I have _eyes_, I couldn't _not_ notice her legs, right?"

His passenger remained silent.

"Right, man?" Garth turned his head slightly. "Dude, are you alright?"

Castiel was_ not_ alright. The rocking motion of Garth's car had left him feeling nauseated from the moment they'd left Colorado. He'd remembered Dean once telling him that Sam had always felt carsick when he was little and so they'd had to get him to sleep in the backseat while they drove to wherever John's quest took them next. Castiel had _tried_ to sleep, but he didn't know how to make it happen. Instead he'd spent the past few hours making minimal comments in the barrage of Garth's stories and feeling like his insides were trying to make it outside.

"Because you don't look alright," Garth added as he stopped the car and killed the engine, pointing to the rear view mirror as he did so.

Cas lifted his head slightly and looked at his reflection; his hair was messier than usual, dampened as it was by the sweat on his forehead. His eyes looked glassy and unfocussed. "I believe the phrase is 'I feel like death."

"Aw come on, man," Garth slapped him on the shoulder much too heavily. "It's just a bit of carsickness. It happens to the best of us."

Castiel was left with nothing to do but follow Garth out of the car, the wound on his stomach flaring slightly in pain as he unfolded himself from the vehicle; he was lucky that it was almost completely healed by the time Metatron had…acted, otherwise he knew he'd been in serious trouble.

"So, are you going to come out and let us in, or what?" Garth was speaking into his phone when Cas joined him. "And what's up with that beeping?"

The door to the bunker swung open and a very ruffled, very, _very_ pissed off Dean Winchester appeared. A blaring sound from within the building burst out into the early dawn air sending a crowd of startled birds hurtling away from the area as fast as their wings could carry them. When Castiel saw Dean glaring at him, he wished he could follow them, regardless of where they were going.

* * *

_Tea, South Dakota_

"Jim?" Alison called out to her husband as she heard the door open downstairs. She sighed as she tucked a stray auburn curl back into the complicated knot she'd spent twenty minutes assembling on the back of her head. She'd never been a fan of early mornings, and hadn't been thrilled when Jim had announced he'd switched their flights for an earlier one. "Jim? Is the cab here?"

_It means we'll have more time to explore the city when we arrive_, he'd said. _We'll be able to get lunch somewhere nice before we meet your sister._

The promise of nice lunch didn't really make up for the extra few hours sleep Alison had been looking forward to at the start of her holiday.

"Jim?" She called again, rolling her eyes as she stepped away from her dressing table. "What's he doing now?" she mumbled under her breath as she slipped on a pair of shoes.

A rustling sound downstairs caught her attention, and she straightened up with a frown on her face. "Jim?" The hairs on the back of her neck were tingling slightly as she took an involuntary step backwards, away from the closed bedroom door.

The wood splintered, shards raining down around her before she could comprehend what was happening. Her mouth opened in shock when the funnel of black smoke squeezed its was through the crack and moved towards her with frightening speed. Alison's scream was swallowed before it could begin as the blackness forced its way down her throat.

An eerie stillness replaced the frantic movements of her struggle after a few long moments. Eventually her body heaved in a breath as it looked up, but it was a different smile that graced the dressing table mirror this time.

"I _do_ have a thing for redheads." Her lips curled into a smirk as she began unpicking the grips from her hair, allowing the lengths to tumble over her shoulders.

Alison, a prisoner in her own body, could do nothing as her legs carried her away from her bedroom and down the stairs. She couldn't even scream when she saw Jim's broken body lying on the driveway.

* * *

_Lebanon, Kansas_

"Have you tried pressing the off switch?" Garth mumbled through the fistful of gummy bears he was currently chewing to cover the taste of the holy water Dean had made him and Castiel drink before admitting them to the bunker.

Dean only hunched his shoulders further and strode away from the small group amassed by the bunker's control systems, the piercing wails of the sirens on their fourth hour of torment. He braced his arms against the back of a chair and tried to focus on the world map displayed on the table. He would have liked to go back down to the dungeon just to get away, but he wasn't quite up to facing another bitchface from Sam just yet.

Kevin, however, rolled his eyes. "Funnily enough, no, we didn't try that."

"Why not?" Cas frowned in confusion.

Dean's noise of disbelief filtered through the air, loud enough to carry over the incessant din.

Garth leaned past the angel and pressed his thumb against a small, nondescript button on the console next to Kevin's head. The unit emitted a faint _clunk_ before the alarm abruptly silenced itself.

The change was so unexpected that for a moment Dean thought he'd finally gone deaf.

Until Kevin shrieked, "How did you do that?"

Garth, completely nonplussed by Kevin's hysteria, shook his head. "That's the off switch."

"What?" Kevin replied stupidly, his eyes round in surprise.

Garth shrugged. "This is a Zenith 490 alarm system." He looked appraisingly at the different components. "Modified, obviously. This is some seriously vintage stuff."

Dean scrubbed his hands over his face, torn between whether to hug the life out of Garth for finally stopping the infernal noise, or wallowing in the shame that Garth had solved the problem in less than five minutes.

The decision to do neither was made for him when Kevin's raised voice caused him to look away from the map table. "Castiel?"

Dean watched as Cas reached out one arm to support himself against the wall. _Shit_, had he looked that awful the whole time? Cas's skin had taken on such a tinge of grey that it looked almost translucent in the yellow lights of the bunker.

"Dude, I told you you looked rough," Garth frowned.

Cas's eyes closed before he slid slightly down the wall, his knees doing a valiant job of keeping him upright. It was the accompanying breath of surprise that spurred Dean into action.

"Cas?" He snapped, irritation and concern twining together as they so often did when it came to dealing with a particular Angel of the Lord. "Cas, man, what's wrong?" He took a few long strides before tentatively (well, as tentatively as Dean Winchester ever did anything) grasping Castiel's shoulder.

Cas's eyes snapped open, bluer than usual against the sickly pallor of his skin. "It hurts."

The ragged confession surprised Dean enough that for a couple of seconds he couldn't respond. Cas hated acknowledging discomfort, a point Dean had always sympathised with, so this admission was, in itself, enough to put Dean on the back foot.

Dean searched Cas's face for more information, but it was the hitched breath accompanying a slight shift in the slumped man's stance that had Dean's eyes raking over Cas in an attempt to catalogue any clues.

"Fuck," Dean hissed as his gaze finally fell on where Cas was clutching his right forearm. Even with his fingers pressed tightly over the skin below his rolled up shirtsleeve a trickle of deep crimson snaked between the gaps, staining sallow skin.

Cas, with a look of horrified fascination, removed his hand. The shallow cut he had made with Dean's silver blade at the entrance to the bunker wasn't healing the way he'd stupidly expected it would; it wasn't even healing at the rate he would expect to see from Dean or Sam.

Dean felt ill when Cas looked back up at him in sheer surprise. "No angel juice left?"

Cas staggered slightly and Dean wanted to punch himself for the inappropriately timed question. _Nice work, Winchester_, he berated himself.

"No," Cas growled, the pitch of his voice even lower than usual. "No angel juice left."

"Kevin," Dean barked, looking away from Cas' arm, "get the medical kit. Garth, I need you to start making some calls; see what you can find out about all these fallen angels?"

Dean felt Cas flinch when he said _fallen angels_ and he immediately regretted his word choice. "Okay, Cas," he murmured, far gentler than before when Kevin and Garth moved away, "we need to get you sat down. It's just a scratch, but it's probably taking your body a little longer to heal." He draped Cas's arm around his shoulders, taking his weight as they shuffled towards the map table.

"Dean?" Cas said quietly after they'd taken a couple of steps.

"Yeah, Cas?" Dean concentrated on not tripping over as Cas leaned more heavily into his side.

"I'm sorry," Cas all but whispered, grinding the words through his teeth before his knees finally crumpled.

Dean's quick reflexes stopped them crashing painfully to the unforgiving floor, but there wasn't much that three decades of hunting could help with when it came to the wave of guilt that hit him with all the subtlety of a tsunami.

"It's alright, Cas," Dean muttered as he tightened his hold. "It'll be alright."

* * *

Sam sighed in relief as the alarm finally ceased. He wasn't sure how long he'd been in the dungeon; at a guess he'd say it was somewhere between four and five hours, but between the blaring siren (muffled though it was) and Crowley's recent descent into snoring it had seemed like much longer. He was starting to wonder whether taking a chance at removing the handcuffs would have been a more sensible option.

A particularly obnoxious snort from the King of Hell had Sam's head turning towards his cellmate in the dark.

"Wha-?" Crowley mumbled. "What's going on?" His words were slurred, and for just a second Sam was sure he'd heard the distinctive roll of a New York accent instead of the gravelly British he was used to.

"Crowley?" Sam asked, not really sure he wanted an answer. Something had happened in that church, he was sure of it. He hadn't completed the ritual, but the memory of a far more submissive man rattled Sam more than he'd care to admit. Not that he felt he could trust any of what he remembered from South Dakota.

"Moose?"

Crowley it was then. Sam shook his head; the wailing siren had obviously screwed with his mind enough to imagine a difference in the demon's voice.

"Moose, sweetheart," Crowley drawled, " you shouldn't start conversations you're not willing to participate in. It's rude."

Sam rolled his eyes, but remained silent.

"So that's how it's gonna be?" Crowley replied, a faint leer detectable in his voice. "Sam, Sam, Sam, and here I was thinking we were getting somewhere. You've surprised me though; I never took you for the whips and chains type. Your brother on the other hand-"

Sam choked on his own saliva.

Crowley chuckled. "It shows how wrong you can be."

"Do you ever shut up?" Sam sighed. He wasn't as good as Dean at ignoring people (seriously, his brother had championship skills when it came to the cold shoulder), and he couldn't exactly just leave the room considering he was shackled to the wall.

"Not often," Crowley replied. "I do rather like the sound of my voice. It's got the perfect tone for villainous monologuing, don't you think? Rich, but still maintaining just a hint of danger."

Sam stretched his leg out, wondering if there was some way he could inflict damage on Crowley with the limb.

"And it gets me membership to the gravel club," Crowley continued, clearly not even remotely bothered that Sam was trying to ignore him. "Makes me feel like I fit in when conversing with the Winchesters, or our mutual friend Castiel."

Blessedly Crowley seemed to run out of steam at the lack of audience participation and silence settled once more over the dungeon. It wasn't lost on Sam how ridiculous that sounded…

Of course the silence could never last.

"Nice place you've got here," Crowley stated, and was that a faint hint of admiration in his tone? "Dark, a little bit dank, and straight out of a horror movie. Typically Winchester, of course; can't do anything without a sense of showmanship creeping in."

"Says you?" Sam griped before he could stop himself. _Great_, he chided himself, _of course you should respond like a sullen teenager._

"There you are, Moose." Crowley's grin was audible. "I thought I'd lost you there for a while. I have to say this would be a lot more fun if it was Squirrel down here with me; at least he can be quite chatty if you piss him off enough. All that pent up bravado and narcissism needs an outlet."

"Don't worry about Dean, Crowley," Sam replied, "he'll be down here soon enough."

"I look forward to it," Crowley chuckled. "And my ex-business partner? I find it hard to believe he's not slinking round here somewhere in that Dick Tracy getup. Someone should buy him the hat for Christmas."

Sam frowned. He knew Crowley had been out of it back at the church, but had he really missed what had happened with the angels? It was probably safer not to ask. The less Crowley knew, the better.

"Why didn't you finish me off then?"

The question was so unexpected that Sam couldn't stop his head whipping round to look towards Crowley in the pitch-blackness. "What?"

"Back there," Crowley replied. "I thought you were dead set on closing up my little shop of horrors for all eternity."

Sam thought carefully about how to respond. Staying silent would be an explanation in itself, but telling Crowley the truth wasn't really an option. "Some new information came to light."

Crowley laughed. "New information came to light? What is this, CSI?"

Sam stayed silent this time.

"Well, well, well," Crowley added eventually, "it looks like I've got a little mystery to solve. It should be a nice way to pass the time considering it's a bit too dark to finish the Times' crossword. It reminds me of a little place I once had somewhere near the seventh circle. It was-"

Sam let Crowley's voice fade into the background letting his head drop back on to the wall with a stifled groan of despair.

* * *

Dean was frowning down at where Cas was sprawled on his bed. It was weird to see the angel, or _not angel_ Dean supposed, asleep. Although, thinking about it 'asleep' wasn't quite the right term; 'loss of consciousness' was more appropriate, but hunters always had a way of sugar-coating things when necessary.

It was also weird to see Cas sans trench coat, suit jacket and tie. It made Dean feel uneasy; something about the sight seeming far less _Cas_, and far more _Jimmy_. Although they'd never really explicitly discussed it, Dean knew that Jimmy Novak (poor guy) was long gone; it was surprising enough that Cas had done a Lazarus more than once, he really couldn't hold out much hope for Jimmy being able to do the same.

So here he was again – Castiel, former Angel of the Lord, master tactician and vengeful God, reduced to a baby in a trench coat. Or in shirtsleeves, as the case actually was. By some miracle – although Dean was hesitant about even _thinking_ that word – Cas had once more ducked the fate that was handed to him.

One day Dean was going to have to sit down and think long and hard about how Cas managed to break every single rule of existence _repeatedly_, but that day was not now, and the queasy feeling in his gut warned Dean away from that line of thought for the moment.

He'd done a decent job of patching Cas's arm up. The only explanation Dean had for the disproportionate reaction of Cas's body to the shallow gash was that this body, a reincarnated form of Jimmy Novak's or some version of it, wasn't used to injury without the angel's Grace there to begin the healing process.

But if Cas had fallen, as in _literally_ fallen, the way Dean had seen the other angels do so over South Dakota then how was he still alive? Why hadn't Garth discovered a crumpled mess instead of a walking, talking (and grumpy, apparently) very much _alive_ Cas? Or if not the crumpled mess, why hadn't Cas spirited off into the ether like the other angels were reported to have done?

Dean rubbed his palms over his face, pushing air noisily through his lips in frustration. He pinched the bridge of his nose as he felt the beginnings of a headache; how he'd managed to avoid one throughout the alarm debacle he didn't know, but too many questions surrounding Cas had his head spinning in seconds.

"You're even frustrating when you're asleep," Dean muttered irritably as he turned to walk out of his bedroom. He wasn't sure why he'd chosen to bring Cas in here – Kevin had, after all, offered up his bed in the only other currently habitable bedroom in the bunker. Dean shook his head, "It's like the Municipal Orphanage in here now."

He paused as he caught sight of his mother's photograph propped against the wall. "I hope you and Dad are kicking Metatron's ass up there, Mom," he whispered. "I know what you said about angels watching over me, but seriously, I could do without _that_ one."

Shaking his head again -because seriously how was _this _his life? – Dean gave Cas a final glance before quietly closing the door behind him.

"How's he doing?"

Dean clutched his chest in surprise at the sudden voice. "Jesus, Garth. Are you trying to give me a heart attack?"

Garth winced. "Sorry." He held out a small bag. "Gummy bear?"

Dean rolled his eyes. "I'm glad we never got you and Gabriel together."

"What?"

"Nothing." Dean lowered his voice slightly. "Did you find anything out about the angels?"

Garth shook his head. "Nobody's seen or heard anything unusual; well, nothing unusual after the falling out of the sky part. The news is reporting it as an unexpected meteor shower."

"Worldwide?" Dean frowned. "And people are buying that?"

"People'll believe anything if it makes them feel better." Garth nodded sagely.

Dean couldn't really argue with that. "And what about what happened to Sam? Any idea if we can take the cuffs off?"

"You said that Crowley was 'improving' while Sam was getting worse," Garth replied, "so maybe there's something like a balance between two linked beings."

"Sam's not linked to Crowley," Dean snapped on instinct.

"Dean," Garth said gravely, not raising his voice, "Crowley has Sam's blood running through his veins. They're linked, whether you want to accept it or not."

Dean could feel every defensive mechanism he had snapping into place; there was no way he was ever going to let his brother be grouped alongside demons ever again. That time had passed, and Dean would defy anyone who suggested otherwise.

"Whoa, whoa, relax." Garth took a step backwards. "I'm not saying Sam's a demon."

"Damn right you're not."

"All I'm saying is that it might be safe to assume that as the effect of Sam's blood wears off in Crowley the balance will start to restore itself because Sam will be moving further away from completing the final trial," Garth shrugged. "You could just uncuff him from Crowley so at least he doesn't have to stay in the dungeon." Garth paused. "Dude, I seriously can't believe you have an _actual _dungeon."

"Garth, focus!" Dean snapped his fingers near the other hunter's face.

"Sorry," Garth rubbed his ear.

"We could have fifty devil's traps down there and I _still_ wouldn't take those cuffs off Crowley." Dean shook his head.

"Haven't you got another pair you could use?"

"Nothing with the spell work. There's the cuffs on the walls, but I don't want to risk not being able to move him out of here quickly if we need to."

"Why haven't you etched the symbols onto a standard pair?"

Dean balled his fists. "Garth, do I _look_ like I've had time to sit down and play craft time?"

Garth winced again. "Sorry. Hey!"

Dean frowned. "What?"

"Well you don't want to release Crowley," Garth replied, "and you don't want to release Sam, just in case. But we know that their power is bound even with only one cuff each." He looked pointedly at Dean.

"So we cut the chain," Dean stated as if it was suddenly the most obvious idea in the world. "We cut the chain so we can get Sam up here, but keep Crowley prepped and ready to go in the dungeon."

"I'll get my hacksaw."

"Garth, you're a genius," Dean grinned properly for the first time in a long time. "Seriously, you just _Garthed_ this."

Garth frowned.

"What?" Dean asked, his smile dropping immediately.

"Only _I_ get to say that, Dean," Garth shook his head pityingly. "Just me."

Dean closed his eyes with a despondent sigh.

* * *

Nobody noticed as the tall, blond man in the borrowed scrubs slipped out from behind the curtain and walked out of the triage area. A serious incident had brought a flurry of activity into the hospital so it wasn't difficult to walk straight past the admitting nurse who'd originally dealt with him, and steal out into the corridor.

A sense of relief washed over him as he leaned against the wall. He knew there was something he was supposed to do; a sense of purpose that felt etched into consciousness even if the specifics were blurred for the moment.

He tilted his head to look further up the corridor, a slight chill running through him when he spotted a closed door at the other end of the hall. The door stood out in its incongruity; unlike the pale green double-hinged doors that peppered the long walkway this one was a deep blue, heavy looking and intimidating.

Despite the prickle of trepidation that ran down his spine, he found himself drawn to the door, his strides lengthening as the compulsion to look inside overtook him.

When his fingers closed over the doorknob a frisson of electricity shot up his arm, and for a split second he was sure that a faint golden glow had encircled his hand. The image, and the certainty of its appearance, was gone in the blink of an eye, and he was left with only the overwhelming need to open the door.

There was no great creaking, or fanfare as he twisted the cool metal and pushed; the door opened soundlessly, a faint flare of incense tickled his nose as he took a step forward.

He froze completely when he took in his surroundings.

"It's a rather beautiful chapel, isn't it?"

The voice startled him enough that he surged forward looking around wildly for the source.

A man in a ratty cardigan was standing to the left of the small alter, a false stained glass window illuminating him in a myriad of colours. "Come closer, brother, you have nothing to fear any longer."

The man in the suit frowned. "What do you mean?"

"He who has forsaken you no longer presides over our home. You, and indeed all of our brothers and sisters who were cast down to walk with humanity, who fell from Grace, but were, as Jude wrote, held in everlasting chains until Judgement Day, are to return in jubilation."

"I don't know what you're talking about." He scrabbled backwards, flinching in surprise when the door slammed shut behind him, trapping him within the hallowed walls of the chapel.

"You really don't remember?" The man in the cardigan smiled. Not a soft smile, but instead something more akin to a predator. "No mind. I'll help you remember who you truly are."

"You know my name?"

"I do." He curled the cardigan tightly around himself, a curiously twitchy gesture when compared to the steel in his eyes. "As you know mine. I am Metatron, the scribe of God the Almighty, the God who has forsaken his children, and forsaken those he sent us to watch over. A new Judgement Day has come and you are once more scattered. You, Tamiel, watched this humanity until you were cast down for becoming too close; you and your kind were shunned for loving humanity more than God, for loving Eve's daughters and for providing them with children."

Metatron paused, holding out a hand towards the terrified man before him. "Come with me Tamiel. The Heaven you left is no more; those who betrayed you, who betrayed _us_ are gone, cast down to live amongst those they valued themselves more highly than. Now they will live to understand what it is to be afraid, to feel love, to feel despair. The Gates of Heaven are closed to all but those who deserve to return to its magnificent splendour. You, Tamiel, you are a Chosen One. Together we will find our lost brothers and sisters and welcome them back with open arms."

Metatron's face hardened. "We will find the Watchers and bring them home."

* * *

Sam sat as patiently as possible while Dean sawed through the links on the handcuff's chain. As unhappy as he was to be wearing a spell work bracelet for the foreseeable future, he was practically ecstatic at the thought of getting away from Crowley.

If the King of Hell had been spitting threats at him from across the room, or even spent hours taunting him about Sarah's recent death Sam could have coped with that. He was well versed in the ways that demons could hone in on insecurity and pick away at it until it left their chosen victim a sobbing heap on the floor. And Sam knew that Crowley had more than enough ammunition to rip Sam's emotions to shreds.

But that wasn't what Crowley had done at all. The slightly-lewd comments and the light teasing of their earlier interactions had been as far as the taunting went. Most of the time he'd talked incessantly about what he missed about being more of a freelance demon.

It had been unnerving to say the least. But that was nothing compared to how Crowley was now sitting quietly as Dean cursed under his breath about Garth's faulty hacksaw.

"Where the hell did he get this thing anyway?" Dean grunted as the saw slipped against the links for the third time in less than a minute. "I've had sharper pieces of paper."

"Just hurry up," Sam hissed.

"Alright, calm down, Sammy," Dean replied as he set the saw against the metal again. "I'm going as fast as I can."

"Sorry," Sam sighed, "I just want to get out of here."

"He been this quiet the whole time?" Dean nodded at Crowley.

"Not really," Sam replied. "Hey, how's Cas?"

Dean shrugged. "Honestly, man, I have no idea." He looked back to the saw. "Almost there."

The metal pinged as Sam was finally released. He and Dean both held their breaths for a long second, both hoping that the power of the spell work would hold even though the cuffs were now independent.

Sam dropped his head to his chest when he felt nothing different. Crowley didn't even flinch.

"Come on," Dean held an arm out to help Sam to his feet as he unsnapped the lock securing him to the wall.

Crowley's voice stopped the brothers just as they reached the door.

"What is this place?"

Sam looked to Dean with a shrug.

"Home," Dean replied eventually. "It's your new home." He didn't wait for a response, just heaved the door closed quickly and leaned against it for a minute before following Sam out of 7B.

Sam was squinting under the glare of the light bulbs.

"Sure you're alright?" Dean asked, frowning at his brother.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Sam nodded. "How long do I have to wear this?" He held up his hand.

"Sammy, we're flying pretty blind here," Dean replied as they walked towards the main living quarters. "Garth and Kevin are both on to it, and I suppose we could ask Cas if he knows anything when he wakes up."

"Wakes up?" Sam stopped. "Wait, Cas is asleep?"

"More like he passed out from blood loss."

"What?" Sam's jaw dropped open in horror. "You didn't-"

"Jesus, Sammy," Dean replied defensively, "no I didn't try to kill Cas, alright? I made him and Garth take the tests before they came in. He couldn't get his arm to stop bleeding."

Sam still looked slightly uncertain.

"Sam," Dean said warningly. With a sigh he veered off course slightly and pushed open his bedroom door. He pointed at where Cas was still sprawled, his chest rising and falling rhythmically. "See?"

"He's not an angel?" Sam asked, gulping slightly at the enormity of the confirmation.

Dean shook his head. "Completely out of mojo."

"Fuck," Sam breathed.

"Yeah," Dean replied grimly. "Yeah, that about sums it up."

* * *

Castiel opened his eyes, the thud of the heart in his chest louder than it ever had been before. His arm throbbed as he shuffled himself up onto his elbows, a small, involuntary gasp of pain escaping from his lips. He frowned as he looked at the white gauze wrapped around his forearm: _Dean_, his mind supplied eventually. It was _Dean_ who had helped him.

But Dean didn't understand yet, didn't know what Metatron had done; didn't realise how Castiel had been a part of the plan to expel the angels, even if he hadn't realised it at the time.

Dean didn't care much for specifics; the fact that Castiel has caused this in some way would be enough for Dean to distance himself from him.

Cas pushed himself to his feet, swaying slightly as he did so. He reached out to lean on the wall, steadying himself as he looked around the room with a frown. This wasn't the room that he'd been led towards by Sam when he had stayed at the bunker only a few days before. His eyes took in the sparse furnishings, gaze eventually settling on the small, faded photograph on the other side of the room. Even from a distance he could see Mary Winchester smiling gently out at him, her arms wrapped protectively around a young boy who could only be Dean.

Something twisted in Cas's abdomen; a different sensation than when he'd been overcome by Famine, and certainly far more potent than the twinges of regret he always felt when he'd betrayed the elder Winchester's trust in some way. This was Dean's bedroom; the first real _home_ Castiel had ever known the hunter to have, and he'd trusted him with it. Trusted him not to taint or ruin it in some way during his absence.

Swallowing heavily he turned away from the photograph, feeling that it wasn't meant for his eyes. He gingerly stepped towards the door, the hairs prickling on his arms as he shivered slightly. Cold wasn't a sensation Castiel had much experience with, but he was feeling the loss of his usual layers keenly.

Opening the door, a set of familiar voices floated down the corridor towards him. Firstly Dean and Garth arguing about a police scanner report, then Kevin announcing they were both incorrect in their hypotheses (by the sound of things, he was correct). Then finally Sam, excusing himself from the room.

"Cas!"

Sam appeared at the other end of the corridor, a surprised look gracing his face. It morphed quickly into a slight smile that Castiel was surprised to see.

"You are better." Cas frowned, tilting his head slightly. "I think."

"You can sense it?" Sam asked, stepping closer as Cas continued to move slowly towards him.

Cas shook his head, a forlorn look dawning in his eyes. "I cannot sense anything. I only meant that you're looking better than last time I saw you."

"Yeah," Sam nodded vigorously. "You've got a lot to catch up on."

"Hey, Sam?" Dean called just before he appeared. He paused when he saw his brother talking to Castiel.

"Hello, Dean." Cas greeted him.

"Cas," Dean nodded slightly. "You feeling better?"

"Yes, thank you." Cas nodded too. "Thank you for tending to my injury."

Dean shuffled on his feel slightly. "It's just a bandage, Cas."

"Well, thank you for the bandage," Cas replied, just about reigning in the need to nod again.

Sam was the one to break the slightly awkward silence that fell after the exchange. "Okay, so Dean do you want to tell Cas what's been happening on the network?"

"Yeah," Dean turned away and headed back to the main room. "Yeah, sure."

"Come on, Cas," Sam tipped his head to indicate that Cas should follow him.

"Castiel!" Garth grinned when he saw him. "You're looking better. You might want to comb your hair though."

"Shut up, Garth," Dean rolled his eyes.

Cas' s hand went straight to his head, patting the dark hair that was sticking slightly uncomfortably to his forehead.

"Don't worry about it," Sam shook his head slightly and gestured to a chair. "Just take a seat and we'll fill you in."

Castiel was very aware that Sam was making a concerted effort to include him in this 'meeting', and for that he was very grateful. The need to find some common ground, some _stability_ was currently triumphing over any desire to keep his pride intact.

He noted that Kevin was looking at him slightly warily as he sat. _Ah_, Castiel remembered now; he hadn't been too gentle in his interrogation of Kevin last time they met. "Kevin," he tried, frowning slightly as the young man flinched, "I'm sorry for my behaviour earlier."

Kevin frowned, but then looked pleasantly surprised that someone was finally apologising for the way he'd been treated since he first took the tablet from Castiel's hospital room in Indiana. "That's okay, man."

Castiel felt a rush of happiness; it seemed that some people were far easier to please than Dean Winchester. At this stage, he'd take what he could get.

"Garth-" Dean cut himself off to unnecessarily point to the hunter, "Garth has been listening in to police chatter, getting some of our contacts to scan hospital admissions just in case anyone's, you know," he gave an uncomfortable cough. "You know…found an angel."

Cas's abdomen twisted in a different way this time; the feelings of grief from the evening before returning full force. "When an angel…falls." He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, "When an angel falls they are released from their vessel and from The Host. Their wings are burned from them, the energy released is what transports their essence through the universe until they are ready to be birthed as a human. Their vessels would have disintegrated on impact without the Grace to save them."

Cas could tell from the looks on everyone's faces that they were also experiencing the same sense of horror. "I don't know why I survived the fall, and I don't know why I've retained all of my memories. Something went wrong when Metatron took my Grace from me."

Dean surprised him by looking straight at him. "Wait, Metatron actually took your Grace _from_ you?" Dean brought his fist down on the tabletop. "Son of a _bitch_, he was supposed to be on our side."

"He felt betrayed by Heaven," Castiel replied. "People, and angels, can be motivated into the most unexpected acts when they feel they have been betrayed."

Dean knew. Dean knew _exactly_ what Cas was referring to; the two of them didn't have the most dazzling history when it came to trusting each other when it really mattered, when they felt they had suffered a betrayal.

Sam cleared his throat and Cas broke his gaze with Dean in order to give him his full attention.

"Cas," Sam started to explain, "does that mean that none of the angels should have been able to survive the fall?"

Castiel shook his head. "Even the ones who were currently on Earth would first have been pulled up to Heaven by the force of their Grace leaving them."

"So they should _all_ be gone, right?" Sam asked carefully.

Cas nodded this time. "Unless something has gone terribly…_awry._"

"Nobody seems to have found a dead body in their backyard after it dropped out of the sky, just scorch marks, which matches what you said" Garth explained. "But there have been some weird reports."

"Weird reports?" Cas parroted tilting his head in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"A hospital in Iowa claims they admitted a man who had no idea who he was or how he'd ended up on some guy's lawn," Garth continued. "But then he apparently disappeared after he was seen going into the chapel. He went in, but he didn't come back out again."

Cas frowned. "How do you know this was an angel?"

Dean sighed. "We don't. Other than being found outside a house, after he apparently had fallen from some height, he doesn't fit the profile. You guys tend to wear suits these days, don't you?"

Cas ignored Dean's use of the present tense. "Yes," he replied eventually, "it was deemed appropriate for our uniform; it meant we could blend into society-"

Dean snorted slightly at that.

"It also meant that we could identify each other more easily when necessary," Cas added, ignoring Dean pointedly. "How is this relevant to the man in Iowa?"

"The admitting nurse claims he was wearing a robe," Garth replied, a tinge of humour in his voice. "Like an actual _robe_."

Cas stiffened. "What kind of robe?"

Garth shrugged and looked at the piece of paper he'd printed out the information on. "A blue and red robe."

Cas stood up so quickly the chair tipped over behind him. He wobbled slightly and Dean's hand automatically reached out to steady him.

"Cas?" Dean asked, concern lacing his tone. "What is it? What does that mean?"

"The man in Iowa is an angel of sorts," Cas replied, "but he should not be here, he should not have been allowed to escape."

"Escape?" Sam asked.

"Cas?" Dean asked again. "What does that mean?"

"It means they're free," Cas swallowed heavily. "The Watchers are free."


End file.
